“Not begun!” answered Maddison, putting down his cup and lighting a cigarette.
“Just can’t get a start, that’s all. I can see it in my mind’s eye, Horatio, but—” he broke off abruptly.
They chatted on about matters indifferent, but Maddison, feeling out of tune with his companion, went away with an unwonted consciousness that he was out of tune with his life.
He lingered for a few minutes on the Terrace, looking at the picture spread before him: the blackness of the gardens below; the lamps on the Embankment and of the passing cabs and carriages; the dim mystery of the river; the black line of the railway bridge with its green and red lights; over all, the gloom and glamour of London.
Then he walked up Adam Street and so on along the noisy Strand to Charing Cross. As he walked, unconsciously directing his steps homeward, there came over him that intense feeling of loneliness that must fall at times upon any man who lives alone in London. He longed for some one, some woman, to whom he could go, with whom he could stay, in whom he could confide, from whom he could obtain the satisfying sympathy which only a woman can give to a man. There never had been one who had in any reality shared his life; he had never before suffered from the lack of such a one. But now he was hungry for intimate, human companionship and there was no one from whom he could obtain it. His thoughts turned to Marian. He realized that he did not know anything of her nature; she attracted him physically; she interested him. It did not appear unreasonable that a woman of her temperament should rebel against the circumstances of her dull, insipid life, but he wondered if it were solely against that existence that she was revolting, or was she one of those women who rebel against all restraint? Was she simply a man-hunter? A woman who lusted for pleasure, excitement, change for change’s sake? How greatly she had altered from the simple country girl she had been when he knew her first.
Or had she qualities in her which would enable her to become devoted to one man, to be happy with him? To be his comrade and ally? He must not permit sensual impulses to overthrow his reason. He must not allow Marian to become part of his life, only to find that he was not part of hers.
